Assessment Validation Overview: Steps to Validate Assessments

Assessment Validation Overview: Steps to Validate Assessments

Blog Article

With registration, RTOs must juggle many responsibilities like annual declarations, AVETMISS reporting, and marketing compliance, where validation often causes the most anxiety.

We have numerous articles on validation, but let's go back to the term itself. ASQA defines validation as a quality review of the assessment process.

Simply put, validation confirms which aspects of an RTO's assessment process are right and identifies where improvements are needed. A clear understanding of its main components makes it less intimidating.

The SRTOs 2015 Clause 1.8 specifies that RTOs need to ensure compliance of their assessment systems, including RPL, with training package requirements, following the Principles of Assessment and Rules of Evidence.

The standards specify that two types of validation need to be performed.

The first validation type ensures your RTO's assessments comply with the training package requirements in your scope.

The second type of validation verifies assessments are conducted according to the principles of assessment and rules of evidence.

It suggests that validation takes place before and after the assessment. This article focuses on the first type—assessment tool validation.

Understanding the Two Types of Assessment Validation

An Overview of Assessment Validation

As mentioned earlier and in our earlier blog entries, validation is divided into two parts: (1) assessment tool validation and (2) post-assessment validation.

Assessment tool validation, often referred to as pre-assessment validation or verification, deals with ensuring all unit requirements are addressed as per the first part of the clause, ensuring complete workbook compliance.

Post-assessment validation, in contrast, is about ensuring the implementation side, where Registered Training Organisations conduct assessments according to the Principles of Assessment and Rules of Evidence.

In this write-up, we will focus on assessment tool validation.

Conducting Assessment Tool Validation

Having reviewed the two types of validation, let’s dive into the specifics of assessment tool validation.

When Should You Conduct Assessment Tool Validation?

The goal of assessment tool validation is to make sure all elements, performance criteria, and performance and knowledge evidence are addressed by your assessment tools.

This means that whenever new learning resources are acquired, assessment tool validation must be performed before they are used by students.

You don’t need to wait until your next 5-year validation schedule. Immediately validate new resources to ensure they’re ready for student use.

Still, this isn't the only reason to perform this type of validation. Conduct assessment tool validation also when you:

- you update resources
- you add new training products on scope
- your course includes training product updates
- identify your learning resources as a risk during your risk assessment

ASQA applies a risk-based approach to regulate RTOs, expecting regular risk assessments. Hence, student complaints about learning resources are a good opportunity for assessment tool validation.

How to Choose Training Products for Validation

Bear in mind, this validation aims to ensure compliance of all learning resources before use. All RTOs are required to validate all unit resources.

Resources Required for Assessment Tool Validation

Instructional Resources

Since you are conducting assessment tool validation, you will need the entire suite of your learning resources:

Mapping tool – start by investigating this document. It shows which assessment items meet unit requirements, facilitating quicker validation.

Learner/student workbook – validate its suitability as an assessment tool. Confirm that instructions are clear and answer fields are sufficient. This is a common problem.

Assessor guide/marking guide – ensure that instructions for assessors are sufficient and clear benchmarks for each assessment item exist. Clear benchmarks are essential for reliable assessment outcomes.

Other related resources – such as checklists, registers, and templates developed separately from the workbook and marking guide. Ensure they are suitable for the assessment task and address unit requirements.

Assessment Validation Team

Clause 1.11 outlines the requirements for validation panel members, indicating validation can be done by one or more individuals. Typically, RTOs require all trainers and assessors to attend, occasionally inviting industry experts.

Your validation panel, as a group, must possess:

Current vocational competencies and relevant industry skills for the unit being validated

Current expertise and skills in vocational teaching and learning

One of the following training and assessment qualifications:

TAE40116 Certificate IV in Training and Assessment or an equivalent successor

Validation instrument/template
Having a validation tool helps you with both the validation process and documentation. Using a validation tool makes it easier to look at how each assessment item maps against each unit requirement.
Having a validation tool helps in both the validation process and documentation. It makes it simpler to see how each assessment item aligns with each unit requirement.
At the same time, it can serve as your document evidence that you have validated your resources before letting the students use them.
Simultaneously, it provides documentation that you have validated your resources before students use them.

ASQA does not provide a recommended or required template for assessment tool validation, but many templates are available online. These tools generally have validators review the tools as a whole to determine if they meet the principles of assessment.

Principles of Assessment Guide Yes/No/Partially Comments
1. Fair
2. Flexible
3. Valid
4. Reliable

While templates like these make validation easier, they also allow for judgment errors since there is little room for commenting on each assessment item.

We strongly recommend using a more detailed template to inspect each unit requirement and the assessment items that map to them. Here is an example:

Element Performance Criteria Assessment Instructions Benchmarks Assessment Instrument Rectification Recommendations
What do you Need to Check?
What Needs Review?

As we covered in our blog post Common Problems In Assessment Tools, your assessment tools must ensure trainers adhere to assessment principles and evidence rules.

Assessment Basic Principles
Fairness – Does the assessment provide equal opportunity and access to all participants?

Flexibility – Does the assessment accommodate different options to demonstrate competence according to various needs and preferences?

Validity – Is the assessment assessing what it is supposed to assess? Is it a valid tool for measuring the required skill or knowledge?

Reliability – Will the assessment give consistent results every time, no matter who conducts the training? Will different assessors consistently decide on skill competence?

Evidence Key Rules

Validity – Does the evidence indicate that the candidate possesses the skills, knowledge, and attributes described in the unit of competency and associated assessment requirements?
Sufficiency – Is there enough evidence to ensure that the learner has the skills and knowledge required?
Sufficiency – Is the evidence adequate to ensure the learner has the required skills and knowledge?

Authenticity – Is the assessment tool confirming that the work is the candidate’s own?

Currency – Are the assessment tools based on current units of competency and modern industry practices?

Despite being frequently covered in VET professional development and nationally recognised training, many tools still have issues with these requirements.

To prevent employing learning resources that miss some unit requirements, be sure to follow these guidelines:

Practice What You Preach

Observe the verbs in the unit requirements and ensure they are addressed by the assessment item. For example, in the unit CHCECE032 Nurture babies and toddlers, one performance evidence requirement requires students to:

Carry out each of the following at least once with two different babies under 12 months old in a safe environment, using age-appropriate verbal and non-verbal communication as per service and regulatory requirements:

changing nappies

bottle preparation, feeding babies from bottles, and cleaning equipment

prepare solid food and feed babies

respond suitably to infant signs and cues

settle infants for sleep and prepare them

monitor and support age-appropriate physical exploration and gross motor skills

Having students describe changing nappies for babies under 12 months doesn’t directly address the unit requirement. Unless it’s meant to assess underpinning knowledge (i.e., knowledge evidence), students should be performing the tasks.

Be Cautious with Plurals!
Pay attention to the numbers. In our example on one of the unit requirements of CHCECE032, this single unit requirement calls for the students to complete the tasks at least once on two different babies under 12 months of age. Having students complete the tasks listed twice on just 1 baby won’t cut it.
Mind the numbers. In our CHCECE032 example, one unit requirement requires students to complete the tasks at least once with two different babies under 12 months old. Doing the tasks twice with here one baby isn’t sufficient.

Total or Not Competent

Pay attention to lists. Again, as illustrated above, if students perform just half the tasks listed, it’s non-compliant. Each assessment item must address all requirements, or the student is not yet competent and the assessment tool is non-compliant.
Can you be more specific?
Clarify Further

Every assessment item needs clear and specific benchmark answers to guide the assessor’s judgment on student competence. Consequently, ensure your instructions are not confusing for students or assessors. For example:
What kind of information can be included in a work package?
What types of information can be included in a work package?

Possible answers may include:

Necessary materials

Related costs

Length of activities

Allocated roles and responsibilities

When an assessment item demands multiple answers, indicate the number of answers a student must provide. This ensures your assessment is reliable, and the evidence collected is valid.

This is also true for assessment items with double-barrelled questions or those that require multiple answers at once. These can confuse students and assessors, as demonstrated in the sample question below:

Identify a hazard and/or environmental issue in the workplace and select the most effective hazard control hierarchy.

Answers might include, but are not limited to:

Weather conditions – isolating the work area, engineering controls, personal protective equipment

Work area and ground conditions – eliminating hazards, isolating, engineering controls

People – isolating, use of engineering controls, administrative controls

Structural hazards – substitution, isolation, engineering controls

Chemical hazards – isolating, engineering, administration

Equipment or machinery – isolation, engineering controls, administration

Avoiding double-barrelled questions makes it simpler for students to answer and for assessors to accurately judge student competence.

Considering these requirements, you might wonder, “Don’t learning resource developers have audit guarantees?” But these guarantees mean you have to wait for an audit to rectify noncompliance. This impacts your compliance history, so it’s wiser to take a safe and compliant approach.